The product they put out is reasonably solid, but is nowhere close to what they had hyped up, and has several flaws that prevent it from becoming a broadly useful tool for development of AR applications. That is not good for the XR industry. It is slightly better than Hololens in some ways, slightly worse in others, and generally a small step past what was state of the art three years ago – this is more Hololens 1.1 than Consumer AR 1.0.

But the Magic Leap One’s 50-degree diagonal field of view, while larger than the competing Microsoft HoloLens, is still extremely limited. And the image quality feels roughly on par with the two-year-old HoloLens. It’s generally good, but with some tracking and transparency issues. Given how much effort Magic Leap has apparently put into cultivating internal creative teams and outside partners, we were also disappointed at the lack of substantial experiences from them. But that last thing, at least, isn’t a major issue for developers right now — since they can now buy Magic Leap’s hardware and start testing their own stuff.

Overall she gives the hardware a very positive review, the software a very lukewarm review, and the “experience” a “meh”. While this release is for developers to get their hands on the devices, I believe the hype this company has built around itself has hurt them. No matter what they showed in this first version it would have been disappointing to many.

I’ve personally never used a HoloLens nor a Magic Leap so I’ll still hold out judgement until I do. But I do think Magic Leap is playing a dangerous game with the hype machine. They should try to lower expectations before their consumer or business devices hit the market. This way when the press covers them the reviews will be glowing rather than lukewarm.

We are excited about the future of Hubs and the potential for social VR experiences, but we need your help to test this and make it better. Check out the link below to try it out. Play with it. Share it. Break it. Contribute to it.

Well, break it we did. The team at Jujama put this thing through its paces and we broke it. But, I will say that the experience is nothing short of amazing considering that there is nothing to download or install and it works on every device we own.

The future of AR/VR on the web is very bright. In part because Mozilla is investing heavily in it.

Be sure to watch the video. You’ll see its practicality immediately. I think the app will be useful on a phone, but imagine it built into some glasses? I hope more companies like Dent Reality spring up and I’m positive that they will.

Mozilla has always been on the frontlines of virtual and augmented reality (see our work with WebVR, WebAR and A-Frame), and this is a mixed reality browser that is specifically built to tackle the new opportunities and challenges of browsing the immersive web.

The way information is displayed is going to dramatically change within MR applications. How should a Wikipedia page on the honey bee be shown to a child wearing MR glasses while they are touring an apiary? Certainly this new wave of information layout should not be constrained to the resizable “windows” that we see in current demos but that we will see a rich set of layout and display tools that will make mundane information that the web currently hosts to come alive.

I’ve written about AR many times, so I won’t reiterate everything today. But look at these use cases and imagine them being accomplished, not within a small hand-held rectangle, but in full view using small glasses or — dare I even say it — contacts. It will be a while yet. But this first phase will set a lot of the UI, gestures, etc. that will be implemented in whatever the next generation of hardware is.

We’ll finally get a killer app for AR in 2018. Maybe hope springs eternal, but I’d love to see an AR app with real utility – not just a game like Pokemon Go.

I suppose it matters how you define “killer app”. For me a killer app would be when “most” people begin to use AR somehow. And, if that is the definition then I would say AR already had multiple killer apps. Pokemon Go, Snapchat, Instagram, Google Maps, all of these are excellent uses of AR and hundreds of millions of people use them.

Mixed reality is tough to segment and define. When I talk about AR I think I’m mainly talking about moving our computing experience away from our screens and into the real world. I would love to have my workspace no longer be tied to my work office. To have any size screen I want, wherever I need it. As I’ve written, I don’t think that will happen for another 9 years. But perhaps that is a different form of AR and AR has already “made it”.

AR will be a passing craze, while at the same time making certain niche use cases much better than they’ve ever been. I just hope those use cases are more useful than funny animated masks on social networks.

AR may indeed be a passing craze but I don’t think that will be determined within 2018. It will take much longer to know that. And I don’t think the use cases for AR will be niche. For instance, I do believe my future workspace will be “in AR” rather than VR. (Or, perhaps this is my own wishful thinking). And I think there are enough people like me that would want this to say it is larger than just a niche use.

Of course, maybe I’m wrong and Ready Player One will be the reality.

Regarding self-driving technology, though, Read says:

Problems of infrastructure, distance, regulation, public opinion, and human nature will infuriate utopians who would like a Jetson’s future today, but these are real issues that will slow adoption in the real world. It’s coming, but current estimates seem optimistic.

This I agree with. Obviously.

Many of us underestimate how long change happens. The change we want we want immediately. Personally, I want self-driving to become mainstream yesterday. But I feel we’ve still got nearly a decade of manual cars and drivers to deal with before things take off.

More people should write down their predictions. And not just for 2018 but for the next 20 years. It is a fun mental exercise and I’m certain it will be fun to look back upon every few years.

Readers of my blog will know that I occasionally attempt to predict when certain technologies that I write about will hit the mainstream. While I’m very passionate about a few technologies, I try to temper that excitement with the experiences I’ve had, the wisdom that comes with age, and other factors. Usually, things take a little longer to happen than we’d like for the things we want to see most. And sometimes, sometimes, the things we want most never materialize at all.

For the purposes of this post, mainstream doesn’t mean critical mass but rather mass market adoption. With 7B+ people on the planet reaching critical mass is far easier than reaching mass market saturation. In other words, a company, product, or technology can reach sustainability and never truly hit the mass market. Examples: Tesla can succeed, be profitable, and have happy customers without the world moving on from fossil fuels. A company focusing on AI can make great livings, do compelling and challenging work, without every family having their own personal C-3PO.

Here are some stake-in-the-ground predictions on some of the most talked about technologies of our day. We’ll see in the next few decades if I was even close.

Legal, fully autonomous driving with no human assistance: Mid-summer 2026 – Even 9 years out there will still only be a few select vehicles that will fit into this category. There will still be humans driving on the road. And, only the most expensive cars will have all of these features. But, it will exist, be available to anyone, and be legal in the US. And I also believe there will be small fleets running in select cities for Lyft, Uber, and I believe Tesla will have a ride-share platform by this point. Also, don’t be surprised if Apple does too.

Bitcoin, or some crypto-currency, being widely transacted at small retail stores in the US: 2027 – If Square, or some other platform with high market saturation, turns on crypto for retail SMBs then we can say they accept this form of tender. But, I believe it will be 10 years before we see a decent number of daily transactions by consumers. I know, “decent” is relative so I’ll give it a number: $100,000,000 US dollar equivalent in a single month. This is roughly 25% of US monthly retail revenue as of September 2017. Side note: By this time we’ll see talk of the US dollar being converted to an all digital currency and, perhaps, transacted on its own blockchain.

Mixed Reality experiences used in everyday work environments: 2027 – Today we share links to web sites, documents on Google Drive, and flat or animated graphics to design and develop both soft and physical products. By 2025 many of these every day things will be accessible and even better experience within MR. I believe most businesses with digital assets will have multiple pairs of “glasses” or “goggles” that will allow team members to view or collaborate on these types of data. In other words, by 2030 rather than sending a child a link to Wikipedia to learn about our Solar System I believe we’ll be sending them MR experiences that they will consume using an augmented reality experience on a device other than a flat panel display. This happens today. But no where near mass market. And this industry has a long way to go. Even further than I previously thought.

Wireless internet takes over all cable based internet: 2029 – Most people in the US will connect to the Internet via wireless across all devices. And there will be no limitation on bandwidth usage.

Fully autonomous fleets replace individual car ownership: 2037 – Today US cities are plagued by traffic jams comprised of single occupant vehicles. Mass transit softens this but doesn’t solve the issue due to the convenience of a car. Ride sharing services have softened this even more and car ownership in urban areas is on the decline. By 2037 we’ll see massive reduction in individual car ownership in cities but also in the hinterlands as fleets of fully autonomous vehicles, combined with better mass transit, can care for the majority of transportation needs. I believe, however, families with at least 2 children will still have a single family-owned vehicle of some sort. Again, I’d like to put a number on this. So I’d say 15-25% less car ownership/use for individuals and commuters nationwide.

Mixed Reality replacing many conventional meat space locations/activities: 2050 – By 2050 the majority of children in the US will have the option to attend school in VR ala Ready Player One. Virtual classrooms will no longer be limited by federal budgets but will be designed to appear like cathedrals of learning.

(Because, why not?) An off-planet human civilization: 2175 – Humans will walk on Mars in the 2020s. And, perhaps, a small moon or Mars base will exist in similar fashion to today’s ISS in the 2030s. But a civilization, where people live, work, play, have children, and die peacefully etc. won’t exist on any other planet or moon (likely the Moon will have an established civilization prior to Mars). The reason I put this far-reaching prediction on this list is because I believe the excitement around a human footprint on Mars will lead to speculation about off-planet civilizations. But, we must all remember, we put a footprint on the Moon many, many decades ago and then just never went back. I do think that we’ll be mining objects near Earth much, much sooner. Even the Moon. But we’ll do that with robots and minimal human intervention.